Ricky Maupin is a 2007 graduate of The King's College in New York City, a small, Christian liberal arts school located in the Empire State Building. It has a compelling vision: "The college aims to contribute to American society by producing graduates who command the important intellectual traditions, who think lucidly about the social and political issues that confront them today, who write with force and flair, who speak with eloquence, and who are eager to exchange ideas in open debate with those who espouse different views." Maupin majored in philosophy, political science, and economics. He is now completing an internship with the financial firm Oppenheimer & Company.

His service-learning was not related to the financial world, but Maupin says, "These experiences rounded out my learning. Political science, philosophy and economics all revolve around what human life is all about, but it's just a lot of opinions formed from so many ways to look at the world. You pick your favorite. But when you get out there, odds are you're going to meet people totally different from you. Real people, and you have to be able to speak your mind in a way that shows you love people, or they're never going to listen."

One of Maupin's two real-world experiences was in connection with a class focused on how God has moved through American history, Social and Theological Transformation. To reflect on classroom learning, he worked at the Bronx Connect Ministry with youth who were guilty of minor crimes. The Youth Alliance established by the ministry tries to keep these at-risk kids out of the criminal justice system.

"I got to apply things I was learning," says Maupin, "the stuff about people you don't pick up with a liberal arts education. In the classroom, we might have talked about what poor people need to do, but when you put faces to statistics, it changes the way you look at the world."

"My experiences were more humbling than I probably would have hoped," he says. "I thought I would come in and write syllogisms and just go gangbusters. As I talked to people, I thought, 'I've never faced a problem like that. I don't know what I would do.' It put a different shade on things." His experiences were worthwhile: "I would do it again in a heartbeat."